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Are you good or bad?

Rollo Tamasi

Rollo Tamasi

Warrior for Christ
Member
How do we determine if we are good or bad?
Is it self diagnosis by our own standards?
Is it our own interpretation of Scripture?
Is it the feedback we receive from others?
Is it a combination of these things?
Is it something else?

I expect everyone to give an answer.
 
No person is "good" apart from Christ, and every saint who is in Christ is as righteous as He is. So if we know we are in Christ, we also know that we are clothed with His righteousness. And God says that we can know that we have eternal life because we have believed on the name of the Son of God.
 
Rollo Tamasi said:
How do we determine if we are good or bad?
Is it self diagnosis by our own standards?
Is it our own interpretation of Scripture?
Is it the feedback we receive from others?
Is it a combination of these things?
Is it something else?

I expect everyone to give an answer.
Click to expand...
New International Version Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come? Lamentations 3:38.

Also, the tree even is known by its fruit, good or bad. Ye shall know them by their fruits: Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles: Matthew 7:16 By their fruit you will recognize them.

A tree is known by its fruit; a man by his deeds. A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love.

http://biblehub.com/luke/6-44.htm
 
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A bit of free wheeling paraphrasing from Romans 7 here....
I sin, even though I don't want to and when I do I hate the action. Because I hate the action, I'm in agreement with God, so although I have the will to be good, I do bad because of the sin in me. I have the desire to do what is good, but lack the ability to carry it out in my own flesh. It's true, when I want to do good, bad is just right there.
Now, I delight in God's word, I agree that His way is righteous, but there is an internal conflict that I'm captive to.
Here is where I can break into "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me"... for only Jesus can save me from this fleshly sin.
So, ultimately, I'm fully in agreement with God and do good within my mind... but still get tripped up by sin due to the weakness of the flesh.
Which is why... although I do bad...there is now no condemnation for me. The Spirit has set me free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin.

Sort of messy... but nonetheless truth.
 
We're good and bad, every one of us. That is why none of us are worthy to enter God's kingdom of our own merit. It is only through the purification of the Christ's blood that we are able to appear before the Perfect Being.
 
Let's see, we are no good, we are good or bad by our fruits, we want to be good but we are bad, we are both good and bad.

I wonder which of these responses answered any of the 6 questions in my OP?

My wife says I'm good, no matter what.
The guys at my prayer group say I am bad, even before I speak.
My wife's whole family think I am bad because all I want to do is talk about Jesus.

Where does all that fit in?

I'm a bit confused at this point.
 
Rollo said:
How do we determine if we are good or bad?
Click to expand...

All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes... Proverbs 16:2a KJV

People have a tendency to think that they are doing the right thing, regardless of whether or not they are actually doing the right thing. In reality.

"No one is good--except God alone. Luke 18:19b NIV

Our opinions of ourselves are pretty much worthless. We must let God transform us into what He wants us to be.
 
I vote for nobody's good w/o Christ. I mean, I was particularly wretched. And a weakling. A wretched weakling...that was fun. Human nature is terrible. The heart is deceitfully wicked up above all things...

Without Christ, the best you can go for is social engineering and/or individual, maybe group, level behavioral modification. Reduce poverty=reduce crime. Give treats for good behavior=more good behavior. Maybe instill some worldly values that pay off for that individual...these values, of course, depend on your culture and other factors, like the person's social class, age, abilities, etc.

Then there's Jesus. Be ye transformed by the renewal of your mind...
Finally, some actual goodness in humanity. Not that we are perfect in this world, just...we have Christ in our hearts, chasing away the darkness and giving us something real, something solid, to fight against our innate sin nature.
 
Rollo Tamasi said:
Let's see, we are no good, we are good or bad by our fruits, we want to be good but we are bad, we are both good and bad.

I wonder which of these responses answered any of the 6 questions in my OP?
Click to expand...
"Good and bad" answered the question in the title. As the nature of the answer precluded the additional questions in your post, no attempt was made to answer them.
 
Malachi said:
No person is "good" apart from Christ, and every saint who is in Christ is as righteous as He is. So if we know we are in Christ, we also know that we are clothed with His righteousness. And God says that we can know that we have eternal life because we have believed on the name of the Son of God.
Click to expand...
No one is good but God.
 
Rollo Tamasi said:
Let's see, we are no good, we are good or bad by our fruits, we want to be good but we are bad, we are both good and bad.

I wonder which of these responses answered any of the 6 questions in my OP?

My wife says I'm good, no matter what.
The guys at my prayer group say I am bad, even before I speak.
My wife's whole family think I am bad because all I want to do is talk about Jesus.

Where does all that fit in?

I'm a bit confused at this point.
Click to expand...

So, is the underlying question, are YOU good?

Most are clear on the "none are truly good" thing so, I would say you are talking about are you good as people go, aside from that fact.

For what little my opinion may be worth, the best I can tell.... yes, probably, as are most here, if not all.

What are the requirements to be good?

Loving God and his ways and fulfilling his plan?
Doing unto others as we would have them do unto us? (that seems to cover a good bit of it as I understand it
Charity?

Do you do those things?

Are there more requirements?

Seems to me, some can be "gooder" than others, at least in that they do more good things. So, "good" as opposed to what?

And apparently how much good matters as it lays up riches in Heaven accordingly.

Personally, my riches in Heaven are probably lacking big time but the fact I get there at all must mean I was good to a point?

Just trying to work towards a logical answer to the question for you or anyone. The basics seems pretty simple to do but, I may be missing something.
 
Kenny_ms said:
So, is the underlying question, are YOU good?

Most are clear on the "none are truly good" thing so, I would say you are talking about are you good as people go, aside from that fact.

For what little my opinion may be worth, the best I can tell.... yes, probably, as are most here, if not all.

What are the requirements to be good?

Loving God and his ways and fulfilling his plan?
Doing unto others as we would have them do unto us? (that seems to cover a good bit of it as I understand it
Charity?

Do you do those things?

Are there more requirements?

Seems to me, some can be "gooder" than others, at least in that they do more good things. So, "good" as opposed to what?

And apparently how much good matters as it lays up riches in Heaven accordingly.

Personally, my riches in Heaven are probably lacking big time but the fact I get there at all must mean I was good to a point?

Just trying to work towards a logical answer to the question for you or anyone. The basics seems pretty simple to do but, I may be missing something.
Click to expand...
Charity I guess is a good word.
Charity is difficult for the best of us.
Charity in any usage of the word reflects your Christianity more than any thing else, I think.
 
I don't believe I'm good. By worldly standards I keep my nose clean, but... well I'll put it this way, compared to Hitler's evil I am good, compared to God's goodness I am wretched and deplorable. I'm quite the ragamuffin... I have no plea, only the blood of Jesus.
 
By the world's standards, I am quite good and irritatingly pleased with myself. I don't have to hate myself and constantly bemoan my faults in order to be a Christian. I merely have to acknowledge that my "comparative goodness" doesn't entitle me to a seat in heaven and is not even in the same category as God's "transcendental holiness."

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." Galatians 5:22-23 (NIV). By this standard - which I think is the standard - I'm doing quite well in comparison to most people I know. A bit lacking in love perhaps, and considerably lacking in self-control, but overall batting about .328 with 4 HR and 42 RBI for the season. So I'm pretty much the Albert Pujols of worldly goodness.

To address your question more directly, I think it's "all of the above" - but mostly my own self-assessment in light of the Biblical standard. What others think of me is, I believe, close to completely irrelevant. I have actually heard what some people in the offices where I've worked have thought of me, and it made me laugh out loud - it wasn't that they thought I was "bad" when I thought I was "good," but merely that their observations and judgments were so wildly off-base that it was hysterical. What someone like my wife thinks of me is, of course, relevant since she is usually the direct recipient of my goodness or badness, but even close friends seldom know us well enough for their opinions to be meaningful. I always take comfort in the fact that God has blessed me in some amazing ways at several points in my life where His intervention was the only possible explanation, so this to me is confirmation of sorts that I haven't stumbled completely off the path.
 
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